More Meaningless Numbers

Building on the coincidental instances of a Golden Globe nomination being a prerequisite for an Academy Award nod that I noted last week, I decided to take a look at Golden Globe nominees that have overlapped with Screen Actors’ Guild, Producers’ Guild or Directors’ Guild Award nominees and how those overlapping nominees have fared at the Academy Awards.

The Golden Globes and The Screen Actors’ Guild Awards Overlap

In the acting categories, I didn’t count it as an overlap if an actor was nominated in one category at the Globes and a different one at the SAG Awards (e.g. Catherine Zeta-Jones, Jennifer Connelly, Benicio Del Toro). Because the SAG Awards have only been around since 1994, all stats come from the ten years since then.

In the Best Actor race, there were 36 overlaps between Globe nominees and SAG nominees for an average of 3.6 out of a possible 5 per year. Out of those 36 overlaps, 34 of them went on to be nominated for Academy Awards (that’s 94% of them). And in only one of those ten years, 1998, was the Academy Award winner not among the Globe/Guild overlaps (Roberto Benigni won the SAG Award, but Life is Beautiful was completely ignored by the Globes).

In the Best Actress category, there were 42 overlaps for an average of 4.2 per year. Out of those 42, 38 were nominated for Oscars (90%). In all ten years, the eventual Oscar winner was drawn from the pool of Globe/Guild overlaps.

As with the direct comparison between Globe nominees and Academy nominees last week, the likelihood of matching Supporting nominees is reduced because the Globes (usually) only nominate five actors in those categories as opposed to the ten in the Lead categories. However, the difference between the number of Lead overlaps and Supporting overlaps isn’t quite as pronounced with SAG as it was Oscar.

In both Supporting Actor and Supporting Actress, there were 31 overlaps for an average of 3.1 per year in each category. Out of those 31, 28 Actors and 26 Actresses were nominated for Oscars (90% and 84% respectively). Again not counting the category mis-matches (Zeta-Jones, Connelly, Del Toro), the only Academy Award winners not included among the overlaps were James Coburn (nominated for a SAG but not a Globe) and Marcia Gay Harden (who came out of nowhere in one of the biggest upsets in recent memory after receiving neither a Globe nor a SAG nomination).

So out of the 200 Academy acting nominations in those ten years, 126 of them (63%) were culled from the elite list of Globe/Guild overlaps. That still leaves 74 (or an average of 7.4 out of a possible 20 each year) that didn’t come from this group. Yet, when you consider that out of 140 overlaps, 90% made it to the big show, it certainly looks like a good bellwether.

What does that mean for this year’s batch?

All five of this year’s SAG nominees for Best Actor were also nominated for Globes, which has only happened one other time in this category and five times in Best Actress. The last time it happened here (2002), only four out of five made the final cut (Michael Caine replaced Richard Gere). In Best Actress, the last three times that this occurred (2002, 2000, 1999), all five nominees were Oscar-nominated. In 1998 and 1997, four out of five made it through. So it seems like there’s a very good chance that at least four of the five SAG nominees will hear their names again Tuesday morning (in fact, none of the acting categories has ever had more than one overlap fail to receive an Oscar nod in a given year). I think it’s safe to say that Paul Giamatti is the most vulnerable, though Don Cheadle could easily be left out if there’s a Sideways sweep and Javier Bardem has enough support.

There are four overlaps this year in the Best Actress race and all seem pretty safe, which is certainly not without precedent.

There are three Supporting Actor overlaps, and Thomas Hayden Church and Morgan Freeman are both sure things. I’m still not convinced that Jamie Foxx can garner two Oscar noms, but this at least bolsters his odds.

In Supporting Actress, all three overlaps seem like locks, though if any of them falter, it will probably be Laura Linney.

Is there precedence for all overlaps in all four categories making it through in one year? Yes. In 2000, all 16 overlaps made it. In 1996, there were only ten overlaps, but all made it. In 1998, 1997 and 1995 there was only one overlap that didn’t make the cut in each year (Jane Horrocks, Pam Grier and Anjelica Huston respectively). In fact, since the first year of the SAG Awards, 1994, there haven’t been any years with more than two mismatches total.

The Golden Globes and The Directors’ Guild Awards Overlap

Now we move on to the Directors’ Guild Awards. These Awards date back to 1949, but I only tracked Golden Globe overlaps back 34 years, through 1970.

There were 123 total overlaps in 34 years, and out of those, 103 (84%) were nominated for Best Director at the Academy Awards (there should be an asterisk next to that last stat as Francis Ford Coppola was double-overlapped in 1974, but according to Academy rules at the time, he was ineligible to be nominated for both The Godfather Part II and The Conversation). Out of the 170 Best Director nominations between 1970 and 2003, those 103 overlaps account for 60.5%. Only two Oscar-winning Best Directors have failed to be among the overlaps – Roman Polanski (nominated by the DGA but not the Globes) and George Roy Hill (who won the DGA award but was denied by the Globes) – and nearly 30 years separated those two oversights.

What’s perhaps more interesting is that of the 20 overlaps that weren’t nominated for Best Director by the Academy, 14 had their respective films nominated for Best Picture. And since 1980, only three overlapped directors have had the distinction of having neither themselves or their films nominated: Steven Spielberg (1997), Martin Scorsese (1993) and Rob Reiner – twice (1989 and 1986). Reiner earned the hat trick (or turkey) of unrecognized overlaps in 1992, but at least A Few Good Men picked up a Best Picture nod. Spielberg scored an additional two fruitless overlaps in 1985 and 1975, but both The Color Purple and Jaws were nominated for Best Picture. The only other director in the last 34 years to get more than one unfulfilled overlap is James L. Brooks (1997 and 1987), however both As Good As It Gets and Broadcast News were Oscar-nominated and at least Brooks had already picked up a little gold man for directing Terms of Endearment in 1983. I guess some guys just aren’t as popular with the Academy’s Directing branch as they are with the Hollywood Foreign Press and the DGA.

And what does all that mean for this year’s directors?

There are four overlaps: Clint Eastwood, Marc Forster, Alexander Payne and Martin Scorsese. All but Forster appear to be locks. In the 19 years where there were four or more overlaps, there were only five times where all made the final cut (six if you give Coppola the benefit of the doubt in 1974). In only three of the remaining 14 (13) years was there attrition of more than one title. So according to these arbitrary statistics, odds are that Forster will be dropped from the Best Director race but Finding Neverland will find its way to the Best Picture circle.

Oh, and before Taylor Hackford and the Raelettes get too excited about his DGA nom, they should know that history and meaningless statistics aren’t in their favor (at least if Finding Neverland does indeed makes the Best Picture shortlist). Since 1985, the DGA nominees have only matched up perfectly with the five Best Picture nominees twice (1996 and 1994). Between 1970 and 1984, it happened four times (1984, 1981, 1978, 1975). And Mike Nichols better hope that Forster doesn’t make the cut, since all five Globe-nominated directors have only been tapped by Oscar twice in the last 34 years (1980 and 1977).

The Golden Globes and The Producers’ Guild Awards Overlap

The Producers’ Guild has been handing out awards since 1989, and they are the least reliable predictors of the three guilds (as are their overlaps). They tend to reward more populist blockbusters (The Last Samurai, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone), comedies (My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Shrek, Waking Ned Devine) and edgy movies (Adaptation, Being John Malkovich, Gods and Monsters, Leaving Las Vegas) than the Academy. The PGA had a three-year streak between 1992 and 1994 where they matched all five of the Academy’s Best Picture nominees, however they haven’t repeated that feat since 1994.

In addition, since the Globes nominate ten Best Pictures (and the PGA frequently sneak in six, seven or even eight), they’re more likely to overlap with the PGA, but it is less likely for those overlaps to match the Oscar nominees.

That said, in the 15 years since 1989, there have been 63 overlaps. Of those, 45 (71%) have gone on to be nominated by the Academy, which means that an even 60% of Oscar-nominated Best Pictures are drawn from this pool of overlaps. Trying to find rhyme and reason is difficult as the match-ups are quite sporadic. In 1992, there were five overlaps and all five were nominated for Oscars. However, three years later, there were again five overlaps but only two of them were Oscar-bound (Braveheart was not among them, having been ignored by the PGA, however this is the only time in 15 years that Oscar’s Best Picture winner was not an overlap).

And this year that means what exactly?

All five of the PGA’s nominees are overlaps with the Globes. Though there was that one year when all five overlaps made it through to the next round, the other five times that there have been five overlaps, between one and three overlaps did not survive the cut. With The Incredibles due to be shunted off to the Best Animated Feature ghetto that leaves The Aviator, Finding Neverland, Million Dollar Baby and Sideways. But we already knew that.